1. Field of the Invention
This disclosure is related to the field of travel organizers, specifically to organizers for use in connection with airline travel that interact with an airplane tray table.
2. Description of the Related Art
According to recent estimates, businesses now spend more than one trillion dollars per year in business-related travel expenses, with the United States alone accounting for more than $250 billion. With the widespread integration of technology into business life, business travelers now carry with them a wide assortment of computing devices. Gone are the days when the business traveler carried a wallet and a garment bag. Today's business traveler may have a suitcase, garment bag, and laptop bag, and may carry a laptop, a tablet PC, a smart phone, and peripherals. Often, the business traveler will make use of these devices during a flight.
There are several difficulties with using technology devices on an airplane. First, most aircraft, even in premium seating areas, lack flexible workspace, generally offering only a flimsy fold-down tray table. Typically, the seats in an aircraft are arranged in a grid, such that each seat is positioned laterally in the fuselage in alignment with a seat in the row immediately more proximate to the fore of the aircraft. On many aircraft, the aft side of each passenger seat contains a tray table held upright and flush against a tray-shaped recess in the back of the seat by a clip or latch. The latch is generally an elongated element rotationally attached to the seat back such that when the latch is rotated into a “locked” position, a portion of the latch extends below the top of the tray-shaped recess and, when the tray table is in the recess, the extended portion of the latch inhibits the tray table from descending. When the latch is rotated into “open” position, no portion of the latch extends far enough below the top of the tray-shaped recess to hold the tray table in place, and the tray table may be lowered.
This tray table is not spacious. A typical economy-class tray table is around 16.5 inches wide and 10 inches deep, allowing room for perhaps a laptop computer and little else. When a laptop is on the tray table, there is very little room for a drink or meal and, even if the laptop is arranged so that a drink can fit on the tray table, placing a drink near a laptop on an airline tray table can be a bad idea, as routine airline turbulence or movement in the seat to which the tray table is attached may upset the beverage, causing spillage unto the laptop and damaging the computer, possibly with a loss of data.
The tray table also is not flexible. Perhaps partially because of the above limitations, business travelers are increasingly turning to tablet PCs. However, whereas most laptop computers have the inherent ability to stably hold the screen portion upright, tablet PCs generally do not. The Apple iPad™ for example does not include a stand, and both factory and after-market stands are relatively unstable. Again, movement of the tray table, whether from the occupant of the seat to which the tray table is attached or turbulence, could knock the tablet off the stand. Beyond annoying and frustrating the user, this poses a risk of damage to the tablet. There is typically a gap between the front edge of the tray table and the open side of the passenger seat, and the tablet could fall through this gap.
Further, even when the traveler has this equipment set up, other passengers in the same row often move about the aircraft, such as to use the lavatory or retrieve items from overhead storage. The rows on most airplanes, especially in economy class seating, are too narrow for other passengers to pass by unless a lowered tray table is raised. This requires the person using the equipment to remove it all from the tray table, fold the tray table up, and set the equipment aside so that the other passenger may enter or exit the row. This is inconvenient and interrupts the traveler's work flow, particularly for laptops, which often go into automatic hibernation when the screen is lowered. Further, when there is a drink on the tray table, the traveler must also hold the drink while removing and replacing the equipment, posing further risk of spillage and equipment damage.